I first became aware of the importance of being represented by a lawyer when I was 14 years old.
That’s when I read Gideon’s Trumpet, the book about Gideon v. Wainwright, the Supreme Court case that held a criminal defendant facing a jail sentence is entitled to a lawyer.
As a legislator, I’ve worked to extend this right to civil cases. One of the people I’ve worked with is Steve Sachs, a former Attorney General of Maryland. He argued for a civil Gideon before the Court of Appeals, but the court ruled otherwise, 4-3.
The Covid-19 pandemic has made the public aware of the harmful consequences of eviction. Consequently, two fellow legislators and I will introduce a bill creating a right to counsel in housing court.
Our letter to the editor was published in today’s Baltimore Sun.
“Lawyers in criminal courts are necessities, not luxuries,” wrote Justice Hugo Black in Gideon v. Wainwright, the Supreme Court decision establishing a constitutional right to counsel in criminal cases.
We believe that the same can be said for housing court, where the landlord is almost always represented, but the tenant is not.
Eviction has a crippling effect on families in any time but especially in the midst of a public health emergency. Attorney General Brian Frosh has dramatically outlined the “recurring nightmare” of an eviction notice (”Attorney General: Maryland eviction process ‘unfair to tenants,’” Dec. 11).
Families in our community who are renters are extremely vulnerable. The COVID-19 crisis has exacerbated the inequities in our landlord-tenant system. Establishing a right to counsel would be a substantial gain for working families.
According to a recent study, tenants who are represented by legal counsel can avoid eviction in 92% of cases. In addition, counsel is estimated to save the state millions of dollars by preventing a displaced family’s reliance on a wide variety of public services.
The essential next step is to provide legal counsel for tenants threatened with eviction. That’s why we are introducing legislation in Annapolis next month to establish that basic protection.
Both parties, Justice Black declared, should stand “equal before the law.” Our legislation would enable them to do just that.
Shelly Hettleman, Wanika Fisher and Samuel I. “Sandy” Rosenberg
The writers, all Democrats, represent, respectively, District 11 (Baltimore County) in the Maryland Senate and Districts 47B (Prince George’s County) and 41 (Baltimore) in the Maryland House of Delegates. Senator Hettleman and Delegate Fisher will be sponsoring legislation creating a right to counsel in eviction cases. Delegate Rosenberg will co-sponsor the House bill.
